Knowledge Based Systems (KBS) are systems that use artificial intelligence techniques in the problem solving process. This text is designed to develop an appreciation of KBS and their architecture and to help users understand a broad variety of knowledge based techniques for decision support and planning. It assumes basic computer science skills and a math background that includes set theory, relations, elementary probability, and introductory concepts of artificial intelligence. Each of the 12 chapters are designed to be modular providing instructors with the flexibility to model the book to their own course needs. Exercises are incorporated throughout the text to highlight certain aspects of the material being presented and to stimulate thought and discussion.

AM: discovery in mathematics as heuristic search. Example: discovering prime numbers. Agenda. Heuristics. Concepts. Results. Evaluating AM. Appendixes. Concepts. Heuristics. Trace. Bibliography. Teiresias: applications of meta-level knowledge. Explanation. Knowledge acquisition. Strategies. Conclusions. References.

This book presents innovative and high-quality research on the implementation of conceptual frameworks, strategies, techniques, methodologies, informatics platforms and models for developing advanced knowledge-based systems and their application in different fields, including Agriculture, Education, Automotive, Electrical Industry, Business Services, Food Manufacturing, Energy Services, Medicine and others. Knowledge-based technologies employ artificial intelligence methods to heuristically address problems that cannot be solved by means of formal techniques. These technologies draw on standard and novel approaches from various disciplines within Computer Science, including Knowledge Engineering, Natural Language Processing, Decision Support Systems, Artificial Intelligence, Databases, Software Engineering, etc. As a combination of different fields of Artificial Intelligence, the area of Knowledge-Based Systems applies knowledge representation, case-based reasoning, neural networks, Semantic Web and TICs used in different domains. The book offers a valuable resource for PhD students, Master’s and undergraduate students of Information Technology (IT)-related degrees such as Computer Science, Information Systems and Electronic Engineering.

This volume provides comprehensive single-volume coverage of both the theory and the applications of knowledge-based systems.

The primary aim of this monograph is to provide a formal framework for the representation and management of uncertainty and vagueness in the field of artificial intelligence. It puts particular emphasis on a thorough analysis of these phenomena and on the development of sound mathematical modeling approaches. Beyond this theoretical basis the scope of the book includes also implementational aspects and a valuation of existing models and systems. The fundamental ambition of this book is to show that vagueness and un certainty can be handled adequately by using measure-theoretic methods. The presentation of applicable knowledge representation formalisms and reasoning algorithms substantiates the claim that efficiency requirements do not necessar ily require renunciation of an uncompromising mathematical modeling. These results are used to evaluate systems based on probabilistic methods as well as on non-standard concepts such as certainty factors, fuzzy sets or belief functions. The book is intended to be self-contained and addresses researchers and practioneers in the field of knowledge based systems. It is in particular suit able as a textbook for graduate-level students in AI, operations research and applied probability. A solid mathematical background is necessary for reading this book. Essential parts of the material have been the subject of courses given by the first author for students of computer science and mathematics held since 1984 at the University in Braunschweig.

This book describes in detail the relationship between symbolic representations of knowledge and abstract states of knowledge, exploring along the way the foundations of knowledge, knowledge bases, knowledge-based systems, and knowledge representation and reasoning. The idea of knowledge bases lies at the heart of symbolic, or "traditional," artificial intelligence. A knowledge-based system decides how to act by running formal reasoning procedures over a body of explicitly represented knowledge—a knowledge base. The system is not programmed for specific tasks; rather, it is told what it needs to know and expected to infer the rest. This book is about the logic of such knowledge bases. It describes in detail the relationship between symbolic representations of knowledge and abstract states of knowledge, exploring along the way the foundations of knowledge, knowledge bases, knowledge-based systems, and knowledge representation and reasoning. Assuming some familiarity with first-order predicate logic, the book offers a new mathematical model of knowledge that is general and expressive yet more workable in practice than previous models. The book presents a style of semantic argument and formal analysis that would be cumbersome or completely impractical with other approaches. It also shows how to treat a knowledge base as an abstract data type, completely specified in an abstract way by the knowledge-level operations defined over it.

This new edition has been thoroughly revised and updated to reflect the advances in using knowledge-based expert systems for chemistry.